I installed Dream Linux for someone that wanted a carputer (or rather sold my old HD w/ DreamLinux preinstalled)... had the same question... not sure if this will work in Linpus though

You can try to edit the xorg.conf including the correct resolution screen.

For safe, first do a backup of original configuration, open terminal and:
Code:

sudo cp /etc/X11/xorg.conf /etc/X11/xorg-backup.conf

Then, edit the screen section of your xorg.conf:
If you are on Xfce, open it with:

Code:
gksu mousepad /etc/X11/xorg.conf

If you are on Gnome:

Code:
gksu gedit /etc/X11/xorg.conf

Now only include the appropriate resolution (below you see an example of my screen section running fine on 1280x1024, if I had the problem you are, I had only to write and keep the resolution I would like).

followed the exact procedure, and many other similar, but still no luck.
I have no problem editing the file, no problem saving the file, but it always revert back to the original setting somehow. Starting to give up.

followed the exact procedure, and many other similar, but still no luck.
I have no problem editing the file, no problem saving the file, but it always revert back to the original setting somehow. Starting to give up.

Try setting the immutable flag with chattr on your xorg.conf and check your logs for errors, that should help pin down what's wiping out your config.

Kardain's link is a pretty good write-up. Basically, if you make a file "immutable", even root can't delete the file (without turning it off anyway), so whatever is overwriting your xorg.conf, won't be able to, and hopefully, you see an error message stating such in the log, then you should be able to figure out what exactly is trying to configure X for you and make the change in the right place so it won't be overwritten.

i have the following error when i try using that command
"chattr: Inappropriate ioctl for device while reading flags on xorg.conf"

Weird, what type of file system is it? You can look in "/etc/fstab" to find out. Maybe it's not ext3, I googled a bit but could not find out. I did see some people with the same complaint (that xorg.conf is overwritten on boot).

It would probably be easier to just look through the boot scripts (in /etc/init.d) and find when it overwrites it, and from where, and either modify it, or change the one it generates so your changes stay permanent.

Another possibility would be to save your changes as xorg.conf.mine or something and before xstarts, add a startup script to copy it to xorg.conf right before X starts

#condrestart() {
# NOTE: We reload normally, to ensure the xfs<->Xserver connection does
# not get broken on xfs upgrades, however we must force a restart on
# upgrades that are migrating from monolithic Xorg (6.8.x or older) to
# modular X, to avoid bug #173271. The modular xfs %preun script will
# now check for the old config file to determine if migration should be
# done, and touch the following migration file if necessary.
# if [ -e /etc/X11/fs/xfs-migrate ] ; then
# restart
# rm -f /etc/X11/fs/xfs-migrate || : &> /dev/null
# else
# reload
# fi
#}

I tried commenting out the bottom function completely, then edit the xorg.conf file, but after reboot it still reverted back. I have never done scripting in linux, and i'd rather not, because thats another script that'll slow down the startup time.
Any other ideas?